I know that most car salesmen are slimy and tricky and generally not to be trusted, but it’s still hard for me when I’m putting down tens of thousands of dollars for a car that we’ll likely drive for the next 5-10 years, only to then have to deal with being lied to along the way.

It happened to me not once, but twice in the last couple of days, to the point where I’m honestly just done with our current car buying expedition. I need a break from the treachery and the dishonesty.

ALL I WANTED TO DO WAS BUY A FREAKING CAR FOR THE PRICE THAT WE’D ALREADY AGREED ON!!!

We’re currently working on getting a van to replace our SUV whose lease will be up next month. It’s an upgrade that we desperately need, despite my not being crazy about driving a van, but hey, when you’ve got three kids and strollers and other miscellaneous stuff to haul around, you’ve gotta do what you’ve gotta do…

So we decided that we want to get a Honda Odyssey. We’ve test driven a couple of different ones, and it’s far superior to other brands on the market. But the dealers are really digging in on the price, regardless of all of the research and bids that I’ve gathered around the area. I’d finally gotten one as low as I figured I was going to get, but when we packed up the entire family and went to the dealership, after moving all of the car seats over and doing another test drive…

They up and changed the price on us. By several thousand dollars.

Because apparently the “quote” I had been given didn’t account for the $1,600 worth of accessories that they’d installed on the car, nor did it account for them lowballing the hell out of our trade-in … which is admittedly a challenge because we’re over our miles on our lease, so we’re technically upside-down on its value.

Though for what it’s worth, I’m not looking for them to give me any positive equity on the thing – just looking for them to help soften the blow of the excess mileage by meeting me in the middle instead of paying the full amount back to Honda by just giving the car back.

Anyways… 😛

So dealer #1 tried to screw us – it was very much a bait and switch, and the salesman who had been super-friendly during our entire test drive pulled a two-face on us and was kind of a dick after I challenged the first set of numbers that he brought back to us.

We still haggled there for about an hour until I finally decided that they weren’t going to budge on their prices – they’d up the loan term to 84-months, but wouldn’t lower their price – so eventually I got on the phone with dealer #2 and asked if they’d honor the price that they’d given us if we came the next day.

They said, “Of course!” and agreed to follow-up in the morning…

…when they sent me a bill of sale for $1,000 more and said that the original offer was no longer valid.

W.T.F.

Just for the record, it takes a lot of nerve to tell someone, “Yeah, it’ll be $1,000 more!” and then follow up the customer’s disgust with, “So are you still coming down today?”

This is why I could never be a salesman – because if that’s the level of dishonesty required to do your day to day job, it’s just not for me. I mean, for the second guy, (allegedly) I had talked to him on the phone while he was feeding his two year-old son!

Who lies while they’re feeding a baby, for cryin’ out loud?!?!?!

So I’m done searching for now. I just don’t have the heart in me to deal with this stuff anymore right now, and I’m still getting over being sick, and we’ve got scads of family in town, and I can’t do it.

We’ll pick things up in a few weeks after I’ve had a chance to get over this garbage, and then we’ll start up all over again. I’ll put on yet another layer of thick skin and charge up my BS meter, and we’ll see if we can secure us a van to trudge this clan around Florida for the foreseeable future.

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Scott Sevener is writer who specializes in humor and satire, and is exceptionally modest in the fact that he's probably the funniest person you'll ever come across in your entire life.

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